Name: David MENTRE Date: 05/20/04-10:21:40 AM Z
Hello,
Bertfried Fauser <[fauser_at_HIDDEN-E-MAIL]> writes:
> Hence, for challenging problems, ie new math! and phys!, I would
_reject_
> the lates goodies programmers can provide and favour to have a
stable, as
> simple as possible, if possible provable algorithm.
This is the path followed by the FOC project
(http://www-calfor.lip6.fr/foc/index-en.html). The objective is to
make
a provable CAS. They are using free software for that (the OCaml
language and the Coq proof assistant) but unfortunalty, they have
chosen
to make the system closed source and proprietary[1].
On the Axiom side, there is a path that can be followed: using ACL2
(http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/moore/acl2/) to make a similar
system. Both Axiom and ACL2 (and Maxima) run on GCL. But all the hard
work (i.e. proving things) remain to be done.
> New goodies, may be later added (in a separate pamphlet file
<grin>,
> also by people who do not fully understand the theory and purpose
of
> the program. They can then check against the slow but stable
> code. This method at least led me to stable and reasonable fast
code,
> which at the and was relatively complex.
Interesting idea: systematizing the idea of reference
implementation. And formal proofs between the different
implementations
are not necessary. We just need a framework to easily redo a fast
computation with a slower but safer implementation. Of course, formal
proof would be a plus, but I doubt that it can be done.
Yours,
david
[1] I wonder when one french reasearcher will understand the
power and
necessity of free software for real research!
--
David MENTRE <david.mentre_at_HIDDEN-E-MAIL> -- http://www.nongnu.org/axiom/